Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an electrophotographic photosensitive member, and a process cartridge and an electrophotographic apparatus each including an electrophotographic photosensitive member.
Description of the Related Art
In recent years, electrophotographic photosensitive members that use an organic photoconductive material (charge generation material) have been used as electrophotographic photosensitive members included in process cartridges and electrophotographic apparatuses. Electrophotographic photosensitive members generally include a support and a photosensitive layer formed on the support.
Furthermore, a conductive layer containing conductive particles (metal oxide particles) is disposed between the support and the photosensitive layer for the purpose of covering surface defects of the support and protecting the photosensitive layer from electrical breakdown. However, the potential of the conductive layer containing metal oxide particles easily varies due to environmental changes in temperature and humidity and repeated use of electrophotographic photosensitive members. There is a technique of improving the potential characteristics by improving metal oxide particles.
Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 4-191861 discloses a technique of incorporating two types of metal oxide particles having different average particle diameters in an undercoat layer (conductive layer). Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2012-18370 discloses a technique of incorporating, into a conductive layer, titanium oxide particles coated with tin oxide doped with phosphorus, tungsten, or fluorine.
However, as a result of studies conducted by the present inventors, it has been found that the electrophotographic photosensitive member described in Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 4-191861 includes a conductive layer with a high volume resistivity, and thus the variations in a dark-area potential and a light-area potential sometimes increase in the repeated use. Furthermore, as a result of studies conducted by the present inventors, it has been found that, when a high voltage is applied to the electrophotographic photosensitive member described in Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2012-18370 in a low-temperature and low-humidity environment, there is still a room for suppressing the generation of leakage. Leakage is a phenomenon in which a dielectric breakdown is caused in a local portion of an electrophotographic photosensitive member, and an excessively high electric current flows in the portion. If leakage is generated, the electrophotographic photosensitive member is not sufficiently charged, which results in image defects such as black spots, horizontal white streaks, and horizontal black streaks on a formed image. The horizontal white streaks are white streaks that appear on an output image in a direction perpendicular to the rotational direction (circumferential direction) of the electrophotographic photosensitive member. The horizontal black streaks are black streaks that appear on an output image in a direction perpendicular to the rotational direction (circumferential direction) of the electrophotographic photosensitive member.